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Fracking on canvas

June 19, 2013 - Mohawk Currents

Linda J. Finch, a painter born and raised in Gloversville, will show some of her work this weekend at a symposium called "Women's Voices for (a) Change" at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs.

Finch, now a resident of Sullivanville, Chemung County, says she has seen firsthand the effects of the recent gas-drilling and hydrofracking boom in New York's Southern Tier. The paintings seen at right (under "Blog Photos") are paintings depicting scenes she has witnessed literally from her backyard.

"'What Would Grandma Moses Do?' is the premise of my series of 14 paintings that document the effects that the gas industry has made on our small village since 2006,'" she writes. "Painting in the folk-art style popularized by Grandma Moses, I have covered gas exploration and exploitation as huge companies and strangers from Louisiana, Texas, Ohio, Oklahoma and the Dakotas descended on our town. Local hiring? Not much to speak of.

"Far from being anti-business, I am pro-water and pro-farming. New York is famous for its clean water for agriculture, our huge wine industry and its beautiful Finger Lakes. Pennsylvania has lost 17% of its farms since gas drilling/fracking has begun, according to statistics from the U.S. Farm Bureau."

Finch, a GHS class of 1961 grad, says this series of paintings was completed in part with support from a New York State Council on the Arts grant. The Bennington Folk Art Museum in Vermont will show her work in 2014.